Went with my friend L to a "soulful prophetic pray-in" at Washington Square Park. A return to an oppositional, countercultural existence most of my students are too young to know. As we pick up the pieces, trying to make sense of a political landscape rendered unrecognizable, painful memories flood back. For me, it's the election of 1984 - another time when a mere fourth of the potential electorate determined the fate of the nation (though Reagan received a majority of the votes actually cast). For others it's the outbreak of the second Iraq War, or the first. For yet others, it's what happened this day in 1938 in Germany.
We all recall the words of Martin Luther King, Jr. The arc of the moral universe bends toward justice. But it's long. "We shall overcome," we sing, "some day." Will it inspire, alienate or further terrorize our students to tell them we've been here before?
